Chelstowski had been at EW for two years, and his departure seemed to catch Time Inc. by surprise — as the company was not prepared to name a successor.

"I will be communicating a plan shortly," Paul Caine — president and group publisher of the Style & Entertainment Group at Time Inc. and a former EW publisher — wrote in a memo to staffers (via AdAge). "And my door is open should you have any thoughts or suggestions."

At the time of his hire in May 2009, Chelstowski was Entertainment Weekly's sixth publisher in roughly as many years.

Through September of this year, ad pages at EW were up 26.7 percent over 2009, according to the Publishers Information Bureau. Compare that to the industry-wide average (-1.6 percent) and some of the other celebrity-driven weeklies (TV Guide's -16.8 percent dive, Us Weekly's 3.3 percent dip) and you can see why Time Inc. might've wanted Chelstowski to stick around, at least until a replacement was found.

Then again, according to Ad Age, "Mr. Chelstowski could have a temper, according to people who worked with him, and was not universally liked by executives Time Inc." So there's that.